With the exception of the return of the Pittsburgh Pirates to playoff contention, perhaps the biggest story of this postseason is the cavalcade of young starters taking the mound. There have been 46 postseason starts so far (23 games at two starters a piece), and 18 of those 46 were started by someone 25 years old or younger. That list includes the likes of Michael Wacha, Gerrit Cole, Sonny Gray, Danny Salazar, and Clayton Kershaw. Kershaw, Mike Minor and Joe Kelly are all 25, while Wacha and Julio Teheran are the babies at 22. Almost 40% of the postseason starts were from young talent this year, though that number will go down now that Kershaw, Kelly, and Wacha are the only young starters left. Still, the 2013 postseason is another indicator that the trend of young starters is making a comeback.
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Game One of the 2013 ALCS was a classic. The Detroit Tigers beat the Boston Red Sox 1-0 in a contest that featured more than its fair share of drama. It also featured plenty of strikeouts and a near no-hitter. The game ended after midnight, with 322 pitches having been thrown.

Jim Leyland said something interesting about the Red Sox offense on Friday. There was a grain of truth to his comment, yet it was off base. It said a lot about a team that is very good at getting on base.

Asked about Boston’s ability to drive up pitch counts, the Tigers manager said, “I really don’t think taking pitches and working the pitcher has much to do with it… It‘s not taking the pitches, it’s that they foul off good pitches.”

Red Sox hitters did foul off a lot of pitches this year. Most notably, they fouled off 4,065 two-strike pitches, the most in baseball. The median was just under 2,800. No team had fewer than the Royals, who fouled off just 1,693 two-strike pitches.

Those numbers don’t prove Leyland right. Read the rest of this entry »

Those who made it through yesterday’s 13-inning National League Championship Series opener were treated to the latest chapter in “The Legend of Carlos Beltran.” He drove in all three of the Cardinals’ runs, adding to his legacy as perhaps the best postseason hitter of all time. Hidden behind the story of Beltran’s postseason greatness was Joe Kelly’s shaky, yet effective start.

Prior to yesterday’s game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and St. Louis Cardinals, Dave Cameron and Jeff Sullivan spent about 2,000 words, four GIFs, and two tables covering who Kelly is, his most noteworthy skills, and why the Cardinals chose to start him in Game One of the NLCS. You can find those articles here and here. In short, it was determined that Kelly probably isn’t as good as his career 3.08 ERA, but may not be as bad as his 4.00 FIP either. Jeff offered Henderson Alvarez as a comparable player.

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After examining the National League Championship Series umpires yesterday, I will look at the American League Championship Series umpires today. Even though the ALCS umpire crew is led by fan “favorite” Joe West, they are generally neutral in their strike calling.

For each umpire, I have include their 3-year average K%, BB% and Zone% for both left-handed and right-handed hitters. To get the Zone%, I looked at the number of called strikes and balls in the league average called strike zone. The strike zone used is the same one that is used for FanGraphs hitter and pitcher Pitchf/x Zone% values.

Also, I have created a 100 scale which shows how much more or less an umpire’s values are compared to the league average. A value over 100 is always pitcher friendly (a lower BB% means a higher value).

Additionally, I have included a heat map of the umpire’s called strike zone compared to the league average zone. It subtracts the percentage of called strikes divided by the total of the called balls and strikes of the umpire from the league average. For example, if the umpire called a pitch in the zone a strike 40% of the time and if the league average is 50%, the output would be -10% (40%-50%) or 0.10.

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The Cardinals’ pitching staff, obviously, is led by Adam Wainwright, and Wainwright’s curveball is the single biggest reason the team was able to slip past the Pirates in the previous round. Wainwright’s a veteran, and though he can throw pretty hard, he’s not known for his velocity so much as his movement and command. But behind Wainwright, this is a postseason staff featuring a hell of a lot of mostly young heat. Michael Wacha kept the Cardinals alive by nearly keeping the Pirates no-hit. Lance Lynn can run it up there. Trevor Rosenthal’s fastball is the main reason he’s so dominant. Kevin Siegrist and Carlos Martinez can blow hitters away in front of Rosenthal. Shelby Miller and John Axford have big heat, if also big question marks. And there’s Joe Kelly, whose fastball this season averaged 95 miles per hour.

If you’re being honest with yourself, unless you’re a Cardinals fan, Kelly’s probably a virtual unknown. He’s also tonight’s Game 1 starter in the NLCS against the Dodgers, and if you just glance over Kelly’s statistics, you’ll come away unimpressed. If you dig into the splits and isolate his performance as a starter, you’ll come away even more unimpressed. The performance numbers paint one picture of Kelly. The velocity numbers paint a picture quite different. The two different Kellys are somewhat hard to reconcile, but it helps that the same profile exists somewhere else.

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Federal Judge Ronald Whyte today dismissed the City of San Jose’s federal and state antitrust claims against Major League Baseball but permitted a claim for tortious interference with contract to move forward. The one remaining claim gives the city a glimmer of hope in it’s effort to bring the Oakland Athletics to San Jose.

The city’s complaint, filed in June, alleges that MLB places unreasonable restrictions on competition by making it difficult — if not impossible — for teams to relocate from one city to another. The City also claims that by refusing to act on the A’s proposal to build a privately-financed ballpark in San Jose, MLB has interfered with the City’s option agreement with the A’s. Under that agreement, the A’s would purchase land from the City for the purpose of building the ballpark, if MLB approved the move. My post from June explains the ins and outs of discusses San Jose’s complaint.

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Tonight, the Cardinals and Dodgers square off in Game 1 of the NLCS. The Dodgers are throwing Zack Greinke, who you probably know as one of the best pitchers alive. The Cardinals are throwing Joe Kelly, who, if you don’t watch the Cardinals regularly, you may have never heard of. But, being the Cardinals, it is no huge surprise that they have found some moderate prospect in the third round and turned him into an ace. This is what they do. So, Joe Kelly and his 3.08 career ERA is taking the mound for the Cardinals tonight as yet another example of the Cardinals ridiculous player development success.

Except Joe Kelly is a little different than the rest of the terrific young arms the Cardinals keep pulling out of thin air. A table of the most often used 27-and-under pitchers that St. Louis has thrown over the last two years, to illustrate the difference:

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With all the Division Series now over, it now time to give a quick look at the League Championship Series umpires. I will look at the NLCS umpires today and the ALCS umpires tomorrow.

For each umpire, I have include their 3-year average K%, BB% and Zone% for both left-handed and right-handed hitters. I have created a 100 scale which shows how much more or less an umpire is than the league average. A value over 100 is always pitcher friendly (a lower BB% means a higher 100 value).

Additionally, I have included a heat map of the umpire’s called strike zone compared to the league average zone. It subtracts the percentage of called strikes divided by the total of the called balls and strikes of the umpire from the league average. For example, if the umpire called a pitch in the zone a strike 40% of the time and if the league average is 50%, the output would be -10% (40%-50%) or 0.10.

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When the Tigers fell behind the A’s two games to one in the series, they knew they’d need either Max Scherzer or Justin Verlander to pitch well if they were to advance. As it turned out, they needed them both — Scherzer recorded some critical outs in Game 4, and then Verlander recorded a lot more of them in Game 5, starting in what would’ve been Scherzer’s place. For eight innings on Thursday, Verlander was virtually unhittable, removing any would-be suspense from a potentially suspenseful game. At times on Tuesday, the A’s would’ve figured this would be Scherzer’s start, if necessary. At times on Tuesday, the A’s would’ve figured they’d have Thursday off. It was in Game 4 that the A’s were in position to lock this series up. In Game 5, they never really stood a chance.

The question coming in was whether the Tigers or A’s would emerge from this triumphant. The question in the middle innings became whether the A’s would so much as get a runner on base. Nobody reached until Josh Reddick’s walk in the bottom of the sixth. Nobody got a hit until Yoenis Cespedes‘ single in the bottom of the seventh. There wasn’t suspense until the game’s final batter, and by then Verlander had been removed. On October 6, 2012, Coco Crisp led off Game 1 of the ALDS with a home run against Verlander. He hasn’t given up another postseason run to the A’s in four starts, whiffing 43. It’s an all-time record, and it’s active, pending the future.

For eight innings, Verlander mowed the A’s down. With one swing of the bat, he was given all the run support he’d need. After Verlander was gone, the A’s couldn’t seize their one final chance. This was a Game 5 decided by three separate fastballs.

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Justin Verlander didn’t have a Justin Verlander year, you may have noticed. Sure, he had 200 strikeouts and a decent ERA, but he wasn’t the guy that won all of the hardware in 2011 and could’ve won more in 2012. But that was because he had to work something out mechanically.

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